yale senior essay prizes

Ask Yale Library

My Library Accounts

Find, Request, and Use

Help and Research Support

Visit and Study

Explore Collections

Kaplan Senior Essay Prize: Past Winners of the Kaplan Senior Essay Prize

• Past Winners of the Kaplan Senior Essay Prize

Yale Student Papers Collection (RU 331)

Kaplan Senior Essay Prize-winning essays not available online in EliScholar may be available in the Yale Student Papers Collection (RU 331) in Manuscripts and Archives.

Quick Links

Library Prizes

About the Library

For More Information

Moira Fitzgerald

Program Director for Reference & User Assessment

e-mail: [email protected]

This prize, given since 2003 for senior essays making significant use of the collections in Manuscripts and Archives, Sterling Memorial Library, was expanded in 2022 to include use of all of the Yale Library's special collections.

• Leo Egger (Trumbull College).   “Living its Strange Life” A literary biography of Margery Latimer from the archives in 18 scenes. Advisor: Professor Karin Roffman. Department: Humanities.
• AJ Laird (Benjamin Franklin College).  Whaling Logbooks: Colonial Knowledge Acquisition in the Pacific World Advisor: Professor Paul Sabin. Department: History.
• Shira Minsk (Pauli Murray College).  Steady Through Time: Ella Barksdale Brown and the Perception-Based Politics of Black Women’s Racial Uplift in 20th Century America Advisor: Professor Matthew Jacobson. Department: History.
• Lydia Broderick, Ezra Stiles College.  Militants in the Model City: Richard Lee, the Hill Parents Association, and the Limits of Citizen Participation in New Haven's Urban Renewal Anti-Poverty Programs
• Elaina Foley, Saybrook College.  Sense-able Hauntings: Ethics and Narratives in Ornithological Specimen Preservation at Yale's Peabody Museum  
• Sofia Ortega-Guerrero, Ezra Stiles College.  Between Specificity and Myth: An Analysis of Carlos Mèrida's 'Mexican Costume'
• Sam Battles, Davenport College.  Paper Sons and Chosen Families: Blurry Archives and Non-Biological Kinship in the Chong Family Album .
• Sarah Gannett, Davenport College.  "A Cascade of Shifts in the Brain": Kay Ryan's Poetics .
• Madeleine Stern, Pierson College.  "The Language of Our Dreams": James Baldwin's Project of Identity Formation on Paper and Film .
• Nathalie J. Bussemaker, Morse College. Imperialism's Stepchild: Dura-Europos and the Political Uses of Archaeology in the French Mandate of Syria, 1920-1939.
• Steven Rome, Grace Hopper College. The Apostle of Dissent: J. Hendrix McLane's Fight Against History in Post-Reconstruction South Carolina .
• Sahaj Sankaran, Silliman College. Ambassadors Extraordinary: Chester Bowles, B.K. Nehru, and Ambassadorial Agency in Indo-American Relations, 1961-1969 .
• Samuel Bennett, Ezra Stiles College. "A Critic Friendly to McCarthy": How William F. Buckley, Jr. Brought Senator Joseph R. McCarthy into the American Conservative Movement between 1951 and 1959 .
• Ethan Swift, Pierson College. Young Americans for Freedom and the Anti-War Movement: Pro-War Encounters with the New Left at the Height of the Vietnam War .
• H. William Bernstein, Pierson College.   From Paris to New Haven: Maurice Rotival and the Longue Durée of Urban Renewal .
• Sarah D. Kim, Jonathan Edwards College. Of a Healthy Constitution: Socialized Medicine Between the Triumphs of Social Security and Medicare .
• Sarah E. Pajka, Morse College. Doctors, Death, and Denial: The Origins of Hospice Care in 20 th Century America .
• Thomas Hopson, Trumbull College.  The Roots of Radicalism: Natural Rights, Corporate Liberty, and Regional Factions in Colonial Connecticut, 1740-1766 .
• Jacob L. Wasserman, Saybrook College.  Internal Affairs: Untold Case Studies of World War I German Internment .
• Elizabeth D. James, Branford College.  The True University: Yale's Library from 1843-1931 .
• Raymond L. Noonan III, Saybrook College.  Insurgent Labor Activists at Yale, 1968-1971 .
• Jonah Coe-Scharff, Pierson College.  "New Roads" in Leftist Thought: Dwight Macdonald, Lewis Coser, and the Postwar Crisis of American Marxism.
• John (Jack) Doyle, Berkeley College.  Measuring "Problems of Human Behavior": The Eugenic Origins of Yale's Institute of Psychology, 1921-1929 .
• Brendan Ross, Berkeley College.  From Practical Woodsman to Professional Forester: Henry S. Graves and the Professionalization of Forestry in the United States, 1900-1920 .
• Nathaniel Zelinsky, Davenport College.  Who Governed Yale?: Kingman Brewster and Higher Education in the 1970s .
• Emily Dominski, Silliman College.  A Nowhere Between Two Somewheres: The Church Street South Project and Urban Renewal in New Haven .
• Benjamin Will Horowitz, Jonathan Edwards College.  The Solomons on Cedar Street: The Intellectual Origins of Yale's Institute of Human Relations and Progressive Agenda at Yale.
• Daniel Stone, Branford College.  Put a Nickel on the Drum: Problems Policing Prohibition at Yale.
• Joshua Tannen, Saybrook College.  Making the Case for Privacy: Potter Stewart and the Fourth Amendment .
• Sean Fraga, Silliman College.  "Two Days By Plane": America's First Transcontinental Passenger Airline and the Selling of the Skies .
• Danielle Kehl, Timothy Dwight College.  The Buckley-Coffin Crusade: Preaching the Gospel of Political Ideology to Yale and America in the 1960s .
• Jennifer K. Lin, Silliman College.  From Chemical Terror to Clinical Trial: The Development of Chemotherapy at Yale in World War II.
• Kevin Michel, Trumbull College.  A Struggle Between Brothers: A Reexamination of the Idea of a Cohesive Conservative Movement Through the Intellectual Life and Personal Conflict Surrounding L. Brent Bozell .
• Scott Chaloff, Morse College.  Dynamite Tonight: Vietnam On and Off-Stage at the Yale School of Drama, 1966-1969.
• Aaron Wiener, Berkeley College.  Hiram Bingham's Expedition and the Peruvian Response: A Connecticut Yanqui in the Land of the Incas .
• Jonathan Bressler, Silliman College.  The Red Badge of Infamy: John Punnett Peters and the Fate of the Federal Employment Loyalty Program.
• Matthew Busick, Branford College.  Becoming a Yale Man: Intimacy among Yale Students in the Nineteenth Century .
• Julia Gegenheimer, Timothy Dwight College. Between Rhetoric and Reality: The Effects of Ideological Transition in the 1970s-1980s on the Status of Women in the Sudan.
• Mary Ellen Leuver, Jonathan Edwards College.  Defying Death, Disease, & Darkness: Yale, New Haven, and the Institutionalization of Public Health in America, 1880-1930.
• Sandra Chwialkowska, Branford College.  It's About College.  [Feature-length Documentary, available at the Yale Film Study Center ]
• Robert Tice Lalka, Saybrook College.  Surviving the Death of God: Existentialism, God, and Man at Post-WWII Yale .
• Wallis K. Finger, Ezra Stiles College.  From the 'Bland Leading the Bland' to the Mississippi Freedom Vote .
• Laura Finkelstein, Berkeley College.  Disclosure of Holocaust Experiences: Reasons, Attributions, and Health Implications.
• Chirag Badlani, Davenport College.  Walking the Line of Diplomacy: The Mutual Failures of Chester Bowles and The United States in India, 1951-1969.
• Elizabeth Waldman, Pierson College.  What's In a Name: The Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, 1965-1972.
• << Previous: Home
• Last Updated: May 17, 2024 12:28 PM
• URL: https://guides.library.yale.edu/KaplanPrize

Site Navigation

P.O. BOX 208240 New Haven, CT 06250-8240 (203) 432-1775

Yale's Libraries

Bass Library

Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library

Classics Library

Cushing/Whitney Medical Library

Divinity Library

East Asia Library

Gilmore Music Library

Haas Family Arts Library

Lewis Walpole Library

Lillian Goldman Law Library

Marx Science and Social Science Library

Sterling Memorial Library

Yale Center for British Art

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER

@YALELIBRARY

Yale Library Instagram

Accessibility       Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion      Giving       Privacy and Data Use      Contact Our Web Team    

© 2022 Yale University Library • All Rights Reserved

Program on Ethics, Politics and Economics

The senior essay.

The EPE Senior Essay

A senior essay is required for the major and should constitute an intellectual culmination of the student’s work in Ethics, Politics, and Economics. The essay should fall within the student’s area of concentration and may be written within a relevant seminar, with the consent of the instructor and approval of the director of undergraduate studies, provided that the EPE essay constitutes most of the grade for the seminar. The senior essay must be written by the EPE deadline, which may in some cases be earlier than the course deadline, and the overall grade for the course will constitute the grade for the EPE essay. If no appropriate seminar is offered in which the essay might be written, the student may instead enroll in EP&E 491 with approval of the director of undergraduate studies and a faculty member who will supervise the essay. Students who wish to undertake a more substantial yearlong essay may enroll in EP&E 492, 493. In either case the grade will be calculated on the basis of evaluations by the primary and secondary readers, in the proportion of two thirds to one third.

The senior essay reflects more extensive research than an ordinary Yale College seminar paper and employs a method of research appropriate to its topic, which should address a topic in each of the three dimensions – normative, institutional, and economic. Some papers might be written entirely from library sources; others may employ field interviews and direct observation; still others may require statistical or econometric analysis. The student should consult frequently with the seminar instructor or adviser, offering partial and preliminary drafts for criticism. One semester essays should be about 40-50 pages in length, while year-long essays should be about 80-100 pages long. 

Whether students are writing in a thesis or in a seminar or 491-493, regular attendance at the EPE senior essay workshop and contact with the advisor is mandatory.

Click here for a list of past EPE senior essay titles.

The Advisor and Second Reader

The senior essay grade will be calculated on the basis of evaluations by the primary and secondary readers, in the proportion of two thirds to one third.  All students and their faculty advisors devise a schedule for regular meetings to discuss progress on the essay and consider drafts throughout the writing process. All students will also choose a Second Reader, regardless if the essay is written independently or in a seminar.

Students should consult frequently with the seminar instructor or adviser, offering preliminary but carefully written and organized drafts for criticism.  The body of a one-semester essay should be about 40-50 pages in length.  The body of a year-long essay should be about 80-100 pages in length.

Joint Senior Essay

If an EPE student decides to write a joint senior essay, he or she must satisfy each major’s distinct senior essay requirements in one senior essay.  Also, please know that no additional overlap in course credits is permitted.  Additionally, you must meet with the EPE DUS for approval if you want to write a joint senior essay.

The Senior Essay Consultant

An advanced graduate student from one of EP&E’s affiliate departments will serve as a senior essay consultant, available to essay writers for consultation on the formulation of research questions, integrating normative and positive analysis, working with data and evidence, and drafting and revising essays.

The Senior Essay Writing Workshop

The Department of EP&E offers senior essay writers the opportunity to participate in a workshop organized by the Senior Essay Consultant and the Director of Undergraduate Studies. Participants will share proposals, literature reviews, and drafts of their essays amongst themselves, receiving feedback on ideas and methods from their peers. Students writing the essay in a seminar are require to attend at least one of these workshops; students writing the essay as an independent study are required to attend all three. All meetings will be held in the first-floor conference room in the EP&E building at 31 Hillhouse Avenue.

All seniors must submit a Senior Essay Form and Requirements Progress Report (both available on the EP&E forms page) signed by their senior essay advisor, indicating their writing plans (dates TBD).  If you are writing your essay in in the fall semester the due date is December 4, 2023; if writing a spring semester or yearlong essay the due date is April 15, 2024.  Students and their advisors are encouraged to develop their own deadlines and mechanisms for marking progress, but the Department maintains deadlines, which correspond to meetings of the Senior Essay Writing Workshop, for both participants and non-participants.

Submission and Grading

On the day the senior essay is due, students should submit an electronic copy of their essay to the EPE registrar and cc the Senior Essay Consultant and their two readers by noon of the due date. Any recognized standard writing format is acceptable. You must list the names of both readers on the title page.  Grades are determined by averaging the grades of the advisor (2/3) and the second reader (1/3).

The EP&E Program awards two departmental senior essay prizes -

• The George Hume Prize is awarded to the senior essay that best investigates both the normative and empirical components of public issues.
• The William H. Orrick Jr. Prize is awarded to the essay that best integrates EP&E’s constituent disciplines while illuminating a concrete problem.

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies

GALA Senior Essay Prize

In association with GALA (the Yale Gay and Lesbian Alumni/ae Association), LGBT Studies awards an annual GALA Senior Essay Prize . Any senior essay or senior project, submitted to any department or program in Yale College, is eligible if it addresses a topic relevant to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender studies.

Please submit nominations by April 14, 2023, 5:00pm.

Nomination Form

GALA Senior Essay Prize Recipients

Class Day Prizes

In one of the most treasured Class Day customs, the dean and other university representatives award Yale College’s foremost student prizes to members of the graduating class. The Class Day prizes honor excellence and leadership in academic, artistic, athletic, and community endeavors.

During the Commencement procession on May 20, the recipients of the top five academic prizes will have the privilege of carrying an official flag or banner. The winner of the Warren Memorial Prize carries the American flag. The winner of the Russell Henry Chittenden Prize carries the Connecticut flag. The winner of the Arthur Twining Hadley Prize carries the Yale College banner. The winners of the Sudler Prize carry the president’s banners. Finally, the winner of the Alpheus Henry Snow Prize carries the Yale University banner.

Nellie Pratt Elliot Award

Awarded to a senior woman who, on the field of play and in her life at Yale, best represents the highest ideals of American sportsmanship and Yale tradition

William Neely Mallory Award

Awarded to a senior man who, on the field of play and in his life at Yale, best represents the highest ideals of American sportsmanship and Yale tradition

Nakanishi Prize

Awarded to two graduating seniors who, while maintaining high academic achievement, have provided exemplary leadership in enhancing race and/or ethnic relations at Yale College

James Andrew Haas Prize

Awarded to that senior whose breadth of intellectual achievement, strength of character, and fundamental humanity shall be adjudged by the faculty to have provided leadership for his or her fellow students, inspiring in them a love of learning and concern for others

Warren Memorial Prize

Awarded to the graduating senior majoring in the humanities who ranks highest in scholarship

Arthur Twining Hadley Prize

Awarded to the graduating senior majoring in the social sciences who ranks highest in scholarship

Russell Henry Chittenden Prize

Awarded to the graduating senior majoring in the natural sciences who ranks highest in scholarship

Louis Sudler Prize

Awarded to two graduating seniors for excellence in the performing or creative arts

Alpheus Henry Snow Prize

Awarded to the senior who, through the combination of intellectual achievement, character, and personality, shall be adjudged by the faculty to have done most for Yale by inspiring in his or her classmates an admiration for the traditions of high scholarship

You are here

Lawrence manley.

Ph.D., Harvard University, 1977 B.A., Dartmouth College, 1971

Lawrence Manley’s fields of interest include the poetry, prose, and drama of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Britain, with emphasis on literature and society, theater history and performance studies, intellectual history, and the classical foundations of the English literary and critical traditions. He is the author of Literature and Culture in Early Modern London  (1995)  and Convention, 1500-1750  (1980), and the editor of  London in the Age of Shakespeare: An Anthology  (1986) and The Cambridge Companion to London in English Literature (2011) . He has contributed to  The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism ,  The Cambridge History of Early Modern English Literature , the  Blackwell Companion to Renaissance Drama , and The Stanford Global Shakespeare Encyclopedia .  His book with Sally-Beth MacLean, Lord Strange’s Men and Their Plays (2014), was awarded the Phylliis Goodhart Gordan Prize by the Renaissance Society of America.  Current subjects of research include Erasmus and More on war and peace, the manuscript of A tradegie called Oedipus ,  the great hall screen at Lathom, Lancashire, and Shakespeare’s love duets.

Selected Publications

- (With Sally-Beth MacLean) Lord Strange’s Men and Their Plays (Yale University Press, 2014)

- “Lost Plays of Lord Strange’s Men,” in David McInnis and Matthew Steggle, eds., Lost Plays in Early Modern England (Palgrave MacMillan, 2014)

- “‘Heere will be a Masque’: The First Masque in the New Banqueting House, Whitehall, Winter 1621/22,” in Emerging Empires: Muscovy and England in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries , (Proceedings of the Moscow Foreign Language Institute, 2014)

- “Popular Culture in Early Modern London,” in Andrew Hadfield, Matthew Dimmock and Abigail Shinn, eds., The Ashgate Research Companion to Popular Culture in Early Modern England (Ashgate, 2014)

- “Talbot’s Epitaph and the Date of 1 Henry VI,” Medieval and Renaissance Drama in  England , 26 (2013)

- “Shakespeare and the Golden Fleece,” in Ellen Rosand, ed., Readying Cavalli’s Operas for the Stage (Ashgate, 2013)

- “In Great Men’s Houses: Playing, Patronage, and the Performance of Tudor History,” in Ann Baines Coiro and Thomas Fulton, eds., Rethinking Historicism (Cambridge  University Press, 2012)

Undergraduate: Major English Poets; Shakespeare: Comedies and Romances; Shakespeare’s Poems; Renaissance Lyric Poetry; Literature of the Renaissance; Versions of Shakespeare’s Tempest

Graduate: Introduction to Renaissance Studies; History and Historical Drama in the Age of Shakespeare; Jacobean Shakespeare

Yale University Library

• Your Library Account
• Ask Yale Library
• Reserve Rooms
• Places to Study
• Quicksearch
• Search Library Catalog (Orbis)
• Search Law Library Catalog (MORRIS)
• Search Borrow Direct
• Search WorldCat
• Search Articles+
• Search Digital Collections
• Search Archives at Yale
• Research Guides
• Find Databases by Title
• Find eJournals by Title
• Guide to Using Special Collections
• Your Personal Librarian
• Subject Specialists
• Research Support and Workshops
• Citation Tools
• Get It @Yale (Borrow Direct, Interlibrary Loan, Scan & Deliver)
• Course Reserves
• Off-Campus Access
• OverDrive: Popular Audio and eBooks
• Bass Media Equipment

Libraries & Collections

• Arts Library
• Bass Library
• Beinecke Library
• Classics Library
• Divinity Library
• Fortunoff Archive
• Humanities Collections
• International Collections
• Law Library
• Lewis Walpole Library
• Library Collection Services
• Manuscripts & Archives
• Map Collection
• Marx Science & Social Science Library
• Medical Library
• Music Library
• Sterling Library
• Yale Center for British Art
• Yale Film Archive

Information & Policies

• Library Hours
• Departments & Staff
• Borrowing & Circulation
• Services for Persons with Disabilities
• Copyright Basics
• Scanning, Printing & Copying
• Computers & Wireless
• Library Policies
• About the Library
• Giving to the Library
• Purchase Request
• Working at the Library
• Terms Governing Use of Materials

Yale University Library News

Submit your senior essay for a yale library prize.

The Manuscripts & Archives (MSSA) Kaplan Prize for Yale History  is awarded in memory of MSSA Archivist Diane E. Kaplan for an outstanding senior essay on a topic related to Yale. The prize is presented at the student's residential college commencement ceremony.  Submission deadline is Friday, April 20, at 5 p.m. EDT.   For essay guidelines and to submit your essay:  https://guides.library.yale.edu/MSSAPrize .   

A second  MSSA Kaplan Senior Essay Prize  is awarded for an outstanding senior essay on any topic based on research conducted in MSSA.  The prize is presented at the student's residential college commencement ceremony.  Submission deadline is Friday, April 20, at 5 p.m. EDT.   For essay guidelines and to submit your essay:  https://guides.library.yale.edu/MSSAPrize .   

The Harvey M. Applebaum ’59 Award  recognizes an outstanding senior essay that makes use of government/IGO information from Yale’s collections (U.S., Canada, United Nations, EU, or Food & Agriculture Organization). For more information and to submit your essay:  http://guides.library.yale.edu/Applebaum . Submission deadline is Wednesday, April 26 at 11:59 p.m.  

The Library Map Prize  is awarded to a Yale College senior for the best use of maps in a senior essay or its equivalent.   For more information and to submit your essay:  http://guides.library.yale.edu/MapPrize .  Submission deadline is Wednesday, April 26 at 11:59 p.m.

International and Development Economics

The IDE Program is a one-year Master's program intended to help students build the necessary toolkit for embracing obstacles in their future careers.

The global economic environment has become increasingly complex and poses a myriad of new challenges for policy and data analysts and professionals in all fields.

The ability to respond to rapid changes in this environment requires that leaders have a detailed understanding of the economic forces that affect economic outcomes. Careful economic policy analysis requires practitioners who can make use of the most current theoretical academic literature, as well as do empirical and econometric analysis using the latest approaches and methods.

No longer accepting applications

Visit the  GSAS Application site  for more information!

• The Program
• Prospective Students

The IDE program at Yale University, housed within the  Economic Growth Center (EGC) and the Department of Economics, is a one-year Masters program intended to help students build the necessary toolkit for embracing such obstacles in their future careers, whether as career practitioners and economic analysts or to follow a path through the policy analysis field on their way to subsequent Ph.D. work.

This site is to inform prospective students of the program, the university and life in New Haven. We encourage prospective students to also visit the website of the  Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) for more information on the application procedure, policies, living in New Haven and other Yale facilities that are all open to IDE Students.

Additionally, this site will provide current students with access to all information they need on a daily basis and the rich alumni network. In the last 65 years, graduates have followed careers in all sectors of work. We encourage current students to reach out to alumni and benefit from their advice.

Office address

Peabody Museum Honors Student Research

Prestigious simpson and yamanaka prizes awarded.

By Steve Scarpa, Associate Director of Marketing and Communications

Research identifying a recently discovered fossil as a previously unknown gecko from 150 million years ago has been honored with the Yale Peabody Museum’s prestigious George Gaylord Simpson Prize.

The Simpson Prize was the first award given in the museum’s annual spate of student recognition. Two Yale College seniors were also awarded the Greg Yamanaka Senior Essay Prize, given to the best thesis or essay that makes use of the Peabody’s archives or collections.

Dalton Meyer’s November 2023 paper published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B received the Simpson Prize, given each year for a paper first-authored by a student concerning evolution and the fossil record. Meyer was advised by Jacques Gauthier, professor of Earth & Planetary Sciences and curator of Vertebrate Paleontology, Vertebrate Zoology, and Herpetology.

“This kind of work that merges traditional field work and collections-based fossil analysis with high-tech digital imaging represents the future of paleontology,” said David Heiser, the Peabody’s director of student programs.

The new species, called Helioscopos dickersonae , which was found in Utah, shows many of the characteristics of early gecko relatives while also retaining a few features lost in modern geckos, including an opening for a “third eye” on the top of its skull that could sense sunlight. The paper also noted that the similarities between Helioscopos and fossil lizards from the same time found in Germany indicate a biogeographic pattern in small dinosaurs in Europe and North America.

Meyer’s work also suggested another migratory path for the gecko: “It is one of the earliest known gecko relatives in the fossil record. This means that the gecko line made it to North America nearly 100 million years before the prior known earliest record,”Meyer said in a statement.

Yale College seniors John Nash and Adriana Ballinger were recognized with the Greg Yamanaka Senior Essay Prize for their outstanding work.

Nash’s paper “Species Status and Phylogenetic Relationships of the Enigmatic Negros Fruit Dove  Ptilinopus arcanus  (Aves: Columbidae)” attained first place. The Negros Fruit Dove was known only from a single specimen collected in the Philippines in 1953. By analyzing historic toe pad samples from the Fruit Dove and 27 other closely-related species, Nash established that P. arcanus represents its own species and  diverged from its most recent common ancestor several million years before Negros Island emerged from the seafloor.

Ballinger’s second place essay “Museums Making Meaning: What Can Specimen Preparation Tell Us about the Values of Natural History Museums?” questions the context through which specimens collected from the field transform into preserved artifacts. By researching the museum’s ornithology and botany collections, Ballinger was able to investigate how museum preparation often removes or hides auxiliary information that specimens may carry with them from their original environments.

“I believe these findings have the potential to inform how we engage with the narratives natural history museums present to us. Do they burnish certain qualities of their specimens, while obscuring others? What stories are being told, and whose are being left out?” Ballinger wrote.

Last updated on May 16, 2024

Yale MacMillan Center South Asian Studies

SASC Celebrates Achievements of 2024 Graduates

The South Asian Studies Council is proud to celebrate the achievements of three graduating seniors who have collectively made a lasting impact on our Council and community. We wish them all the best as they embark on exciting new adventures after Yale.

Daevan Mangalmurti is graduating as a dual major in South Asian Studies and Ethics, Politics, & Economics, with an Advanced Language Certificate in Hindi and an Interdisciplinary Certificate in Energy Studies. He has been  awarded the South Asian Studies Senior Essay Prize for his  thesis titled " The State in the Salt Marsh: The Conception, Construction, & Conquest of the Rann of Kutch," which was advised by Professor Sunil Amrith. The thesis a nalyzes territorial disputes spanning over 200 years focused on an inhabitable salt marsh on the border between contemporary Gujarat, India, and Sindh, Pakistan, to examine the impact of environmental volatility for modern state formation and border-making in South Asia.

Mangalmurti's senior essay draws upon theoretical and methodological approaches gleaned from across his South Asian Studies coursework, but particularly from three courses which focused explicitly on environmental issues and histories of the region, including  Environmental Justice in South Asia with Professor Kalyanakrishnan Sivaramakrishnan and Global Environmentalism and Environment, Medicine, and Science in South and Southeast Asia with Professor Sunil Amrith. Mangalmurti's nine other courses pertaining to the major included such diverse topics as Indo-Islamic histories, the political economy of gender, Sanskrit literature, and the influence of Bhakti on Bollywood.

Mangalmurti explains that the breadth of course offerings by the South Asian Studies program at Yale exposed him to many aspects of the field that he was not aware of or not initially interested in exploring before coming to Yale. As he embarks on his next steps, he says, "I'll be carrying a way of thinking and a set of facts and information that has really been shaped by my exposure to a diverse range of work on South Asia, for which I'm very grateful."

Mangalmurti is also glad to be bringing with him an enhanced network of connections to scholars and practitioners in the field, as well as professional experience with developing and promoting programs, both cultivated through his time as a Student Fellow with the South Asian Studies Council and as a lead student organizer of the Yale Hindi Debate. Key initiatives which Mangalmurti helped to launch at the Council include regular podcasts with visiting speakers and student networking opportunities. Looking back at these experiences, Mangalmurti says,  " It's been a huge privilege to work for the Council.  I have really benefitted from the connections I've made with academics and other interesting people working in South Asia."

Following graduation, Mangalmurti will start as a James C. Gaither Junior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, DC, where he will work in the Sustainability, Climate, and Geopolitics Program.

Pranav Senthilvel  is graduating from Yale as a dual major in  South Asian Studies and  Computer Science. His senior essay in South Asian Studies,  titled " An Empire's Grain: The Authority of Rice in World War II British India"  was advised by  Professor Anthony Acciavatti as part of a seminar on Labs and Landscapes of the Green Revolution . The essay explores how British India's rice crop during the War influenced the context in which independence was sprung upon its population.

Senthilvel's essay culimnates a longstanding interest in anthropological and historical approaches to the study of food which was ignited through a course he took on  Food Cultures in South Asia  with Visiting Professor Dolly Kikon. His research for the essay also benefitted from his experience traveling to India with Professor Acciavatti and other students enrolled in the  Labs and Landscapes  course on a study tour funded by the MacMillan Center over spring break in March 2024.

The study tour itself felt like a culminating point for Senthilvel. Having previously traveled to India with family to visit with relatives many times, he described the experience of interpreting the  significance of various locales along with other students from diverse fields such as architecture and environmental studies as "eye-opening," and like  " seeing the same place through an entirely different lens."  Senthilvel  credits his coursework in South Asian Studies as helping him to become more confident and knowledgeable of his South Asian identity and heritage. He says, " I'm very lucky to have gone to a school that has a South Asian Studies program, let alone one that's so expansive, and has given me opportunities to go to India, and meet with faculty members who have been working in the field for decades and have done really amazing research."

Senthilvel has also enjoyed opportunities to apply his skills in Computer Science to his coursework and research in South Asian Studies, whether by using scrapers to collect and analyze data from historical documents, or developing a tool to assist Carnatic music students in identifying various attributes of musical recordings and attributes as his final project for a course on South Indian Rhythmic Design. 

Senthilvel will soon move to Boston to begin his career as a software engineer at Oracle.  He hopes to continue pursuing projects that fuse his coding skills with his passion for South Asian culture and heritage post-graduation, saying "My hobbies are also kind of part of my career now, I'm very lucky to be able to say that."

Corril Serrano credits his experience with designing the Council's posters, newsletters, and other promotional materials as igniting within him a passion for the principles of design which he may not have discovered otherwise. These experiences, he says, helped him to realize the extent to which the fact that "t here is beauty and there is impact in thoughtful design"  carries across fields and disciplines.

Corril Serrano plans to build upon his passion for design through a career in urban planning and public service. Before seeking to attend graduate school in this field, he will begin working in a local government office in his native California.

Department of History

Laura engelstein.

East European: Modern Russia; Modern Europe

Laura Engelstein joined the history faculty in the fall of 2002 as professor in the field of modern Russian and European history. She received her Ph.D. from Stanford in 1976 and taught at Cornell and at Princeton before coming to Yale. Her research has focused on the social and cultural history of late imperial Russia, with attention to the role of law, medicine, and the arts in public life. She has also explored themes in the history of gender, sexuality, and religion.

Among her publications are  Russia in Flames: War, Revolution, and Civil War, 1914-1921 (2018) and translated with Grażyna Drabik, Andrzej Bobkowski;  Wartime Notebooks: France, 1940-1944 (2018);  Moscow, 1905: Working-Class Organization and Political Conflict (1982); The Keys to Happiness: Sex and the Search for Modernity in Fin-de-Siecle Russia (1992); Castration and the Heavenly Kingdom: A Russian Folktale (1999); and Slavophile Empire: Imperial Russia’s Illiberal Path (2009); as well as an essay collection edited with Stephanie Sandler, Self and Story in Russian History (2000).

Professor Engelstein has received awards from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, the National Humanities Center, and the Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy.

Joseph Brodsky papers

• PDF Finding Aid
• Ask a Question
• Collection Overview
• Finding Aid View
• Digital Materials
• Container List

Scope and Contents

The Joseph Brodsky Papers document the life and work of Russian-born poet, essayist and Nobel Laureate Joseph Brodsky. The papers consist of correspondence, writings, personal papers (including legal, medical and financial records), audiovisual material, teaching material, student papers, newspaper clippings and printed ephemera, spanning the years 1890-2004, with the bulk of the material dating from the period 1972-1996. The papers document all aspects of Brodsky's professional life, including writings, appearances, readings, lectures, advocacy and relations with other literary figures. The research interest of the papers encompasses Russian-language poetry, the Soviet emigre experience, and poetry translation. Researchers interested in Brodsky's creative process will find much relevant material, including multiple drafts (many corrected) of poems and essays (including translations by Brodsky and others). Teaching material is present in small quantities and provides only sporadic documentation of Brodsky's career as an educator. Personal papers are also present and chiefly document immigration and other legal affairs. Brodsky's work, while rarely political, reflects broad historical and political themes that defined his era: empire, emigration, and the relationship of the individual to the state. The trajectory of Brodsky's publishing and teaching is inextricable from the emigre experience, as his early works were censored in the Soviet Union and promoted by publishers and scholars in the United States. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the Russian literary public was able to "reclaim" Brodsky openly and his works (including Russian translations of his essays) were published there. Brodsky's bilingual emigre identity is elucidated in his writings. A significant proportion of Brodsky's poetry was translated from Russian to English, often by multiple translators, and some poems exist in alternate versions. Brodsky's prose was also oft-translated: his early essays were written in Russian and translated into English, though most of his prose was written in English. While Brodsky's notes and corrections indicate engagement with the translation of his prose, it is evident that his commitment to and involvement in the translation of his poetry was profound. Brodsky's personal papers document his bitter struggle with American and Soviet bureaucracies as he tried first to have his parents visit him in the United States and then to attend his father's funeral. After emigration, as evidenced particularly in his letters to editors, Brodsky lent his international acclaim to the cause of politically persecuted literary figures in the Soviet Union and elsewhere. Brodsky's literary milieu, like his life and work, was transnational and multilingual. Correspondence, writings and audiovisual recordings document his close relationships with fellow Nobel Laureates Seamus Heaney, Czes?aw Mi?osz and Derek Walcott and with English-language poets Anthony Hecht and Mark Strand, among others. Many of these poets translated Brodsky's poetry or dedicated poems to Brodsky in memorium. Hundreds of aspiring and accomplished Russian-language poets also sent him manuscripts, as evidenced in Writings of Others.

• circa 1890-2004
• Majority of material found within 1972 - 1996
• Brodsky, Joseph, 1940-1996

Language of Materials

In Russian and English.

Conditions Governing Access

The materials are open for research. Access to some material is restricted, as detailed in the following paragraphs. Consult the appropriate curator for more information. Letters of Recommendation (Boxes 21-22), Student Papers (Boxes 127-131) and Restricted Papers (Boxes 214-217) are restricted until 2071. The notebooks in Box 40 are partially restricted until 2071. Access to the original notebooks is restricted. A microfilm of unrestricted pages is available. Boxes 168-169, 171-176, 220-225, and 232 (audiovisual material): Restricted fragile material. Reference copies may be requested. Consult Access Services for further information. Boxes 218-219, 226 and 233-241: Restricted fragile material. Reference copies are available for electronic documents. Consult Access Services for further information. For other materials, reference surrogates have been substituted in the main files. For further information consult the appropriate curator.

Existence and Location of Copies

Portions of the collection are available on microfilm.

Conditions Governing Use

The Joseph Brodsky Papers is the physical property of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Literary rights, including copyright, belong to the authors or their legal heirs and assigns. For further information, consult the appropriate curator.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Purchased on the Edwin J. Beinecke Book Fund from Lame Duck Books in 2004. One box was donated by the Estate of Joseph Brodsky in 2005. According to a letter in her correspondence (April 1996), Ann Kjellberg (Joseph Brodsky's assistant and, after his death, literary executor) began to assemble an archive of Brodsky's papers in 1991. This effort continued after his death in 1996. Friends and associates of Brodsky (George Kline, Carl Proffer, Masha Vorobiov and others) sent Kjellberg originals and photocopies of papers to be included in the archive. Provenance of individual items can sometimes be traced by Kjellberg's or others' notes on the material.

Arrangement

Organized into eleven series: I. Correspondence, 1964-2004. II. Writings, 1959-2000. III. Interviews and Speeches, 1974-1996. IV. Teaching Material and Student Papers, 1973-1995. V. Personal Papers, 1961-2000. VI. Photographs, 1890-2001. VII. Audiovisual Material, 1953-2002. VIII. Clippings, 1964-2002. IX. Printed Material, 1920-2003. X. Artwork, 1972-1986. XI. Papers of Others, 1912-2000.

Associated Materials

Printed material received with the collection was removed for separate cataloging and can be accessed by searching the library's online catalog.

115.28 Linear Feet ((228 boxes) + 3 broadside)

Catalog Record

A record for this collection is available in Orbis, the Yale University Library catalog

Persistent URL

https://hdl.handle.net/10079/fa/beinecke.brodsky

Additional Description

The Joseph Brodsky Papers document the life and work of Russian-born poet, essayist and Nobel Laureate Joseph Brodsky, with a particular emphasis on the time period of his residence in the United States (1972-1996). The papers consist of correspondence, writings, personal papers (including legal, medical and financial records), audiovisual material, teaching material, student papers, newspaper clippings and printed ephemera, spanning the years 1890-2004, with the bulk of the material dating from the period 1972-1996.

Joseph Brodsky, 1940-1996

Joseph Brodsky, Russian-born poet, essayist and Nobel Laureate, was born in Leningrad on May 24, 1940 to Aleksandr Ivanovich Brodskii and Mariia Moiseevna Brodskaia (nee Vol'pert). His birth was just one year before the start of the Leningrad Blockade; thus his early years were ones of extreme hardship. The Brodsky family's Jewish heritage exposed them to the anti-Semitic atmosphere of the post-war Soviet Union, causing Aleksandr Ivanovich to lose his rank in the Army and preventing Joseph from entering into the submarine academy. The communal apartment where Brodsky lived with his parents (and where his parents lived until their deaths) was memorialized in his essay "A room and a half." Joseph Brodsky ended his formal schooling by walking out of his public school classroom at age fifteen and worked in a variety of places, including a factory, a morgue, and on geological expiditions. He began to write poetry in his teens and soon demonstrated a keen interest in translation. He taught himself Polish and English in order to translate poetry, including that of Czes?aw Mi?osz and John Donne. Brodsky's Russian literary influences included Anna Akhmatova, Osip Mandelshtam, Boris Pasternak and Marina Tsvetaeva. His early writings in Russia were circulated in samizdat (self-published) collections, the most complete one compiled by Vladimir Maramzin. Brodsky was arrested several times starting in 1961, tried in 1964 as a "social parasite" ( tuneiadets ), and sentenced to five years of labor in Norenskaia (a village in the Arkhangelsk Province of northern Russia). Brodsky lived in Norenskaia from March of 1964 to October of 1965 and wrote prolificly there. Brodsky's trial and sentence brought him increasing international attention when Frida Vigdorova's transcript was publicized in the Western media. It was also around this time that his poetry began to be compiled and published in the United States. Stikhotvoreniia i Poemy (Washington, D.C. & New York: Inter-Language Literary Associates) was published in in 1965, followed by Ostanovka v pustyne (New York: Izdatel'stvo imeni Chekhova) in 1970. Even after his release from Norenskaia, Brodsky continued to be at constant risk of arrest. In 1972 he was forced to emigrate when he was suddenly granted a visa (for which he had not applied) to emigrate to Israel. He had to leave Russia within a matter of weeks. Brodsky traveled to Austria, where he stayed with W.H. Auden for several weeks, and to England before coming to the United Sates. He accepted a position as Poet in Residence at the University of Michigan (a post that Carl Proffer, founder of Ardis Publishing, was instrumental in securing). Brodsky taught at Michigan until 1981, when he accepted a permanent position on the faculty of Mount Holyoke College. He then divided his time between New York City and South Hadley, Massachusetts. He became a United States citizen in 1977. Brodsky never returned to Russia after emigrating, though later in his life political circumstances would have allowed it and his Russian readers clamored for it. Among Brodsky's many awards and honors are a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship (1977), a John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation award (1981), a National Book Critics Circle award (1986), the Nobel Prize in Literature (1987), France's Order of the Legion of Honor (1991), and honorary degrees from Yale University (1978), Dartmouth College (1989), and Oxford University (1991). He was Poet Laureate of the United States from 1991 to 1992. Brodsky suffered from heart disease throughout his adult life and he had several open-heart surgeries. He died of heart failure on January 28, 1996. During his lifetime, much of Brodsky's collected poetry and prose was published by Ardis in Ann Arbor, Michigan (Russian-language poetry) and Farrar, Straus and Giroux in New York (English-language poetry, English translations and prose collections). Brodsky's major publications from 1977 to 2000 include:

• Chast' rechi: Stikhotvoreniia 1972-76 (Ardis, 1977)
• Konets prekrasnoi epokhi: Stikhotvoreniia 1964-71 (Ardis, 1977)
• V Anglii (Ardis, 1977)
• A Part of Speech (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1980)
• Rimskie elegii (New York: Russica, 1982)
• Novye stansy k Avguste: Stikhi k M.B., 1962-1982 (Ardis, 1983)
• Less Than One: Selected Essays (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1986)
• Uraniia (Ardis, 1987)
• To Urania: Selected Poems 1965-1985 (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1988)
• Watermark (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1992)
• On Grief and Reason: Essays (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1995)
• Peizazh s navodneniem (Dana Point, California: Ardis, 1996)
• So Forth: Poems (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1996)
• Collected Poems in English, 1972-1999 (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2000)

Processing Information

The collection was formerly classed as Uncat.MSS 649, Uncat.MSS 766, Uncat.MSS 876 and Uncat.MSS 926. The Library of Congress system is used to transliterate Russian, but diacritics are not used. Illustrative examples are: Iuz Aleshkovskii and Efim Etkind. Names of Russian emigres are spelled in accordance with the individual's usage or record of publication. Therefore these spellings do not necessarily conform to standard Library of Congress transliteration. For example, the spelling Joseph Brodsky is used throughout the finding aid, while Brodsky's parents are referred to as Aleksandr Brodskii and Mariia Brodskaia. Electronic files were refreshed into the Yale University Library Rescue Repository. Technical specifications are filed with the media in Restricted Fragile. Boxes 227-231 and folders 3767-3822 and 4710-4758 are unused. Original videocassettes are now housed in boxes 171-176. Restricted fragile material. Boxes 161-167 and folders 3645-3723, 3725-3736, 3747-3756, 3758-3766 are unused. Original audiocassettes and reel-to-reel audiotapes are now housed in boxes 220-225 and 232. Restricted fragile material.

• American literature -- 20th century
• Ardis (Firm)
• Auden, W. H. (Wystan Hugh), 1907-1973
• Audiocassettes
• Audiovisual materials
• Authors, American -- 20th Century -- Archives
• Authors, Russian -- 20th Century -- Archives
• Barańczak, Stanisław, 1946-2014
• Berlin, Isaiah, 1909-1997
• Born digital
• Brodski, Mariia
• Brodskiĭ, Aleksandr
• Clippings (information artifacts)
• Dovlatov, Sergeĭ, 1941-1990
• Electronic documents
• Emigration and immigration
• Essays -- 20th Century
• Essays -- Translations into English
• Essays -- Translations into Russian
• Farrar, Straus, and Giroux
• Golyshev, Viktor, 1937-
• Hecht, Anthony, 1923-2004
• Jangfeldt, Bengt, 1948-
• Katilius, Elmira
• Katilius, Ramunas, 1935-2014
• Kjellberg, Ann
• Kline, George L. (George Louis), 1921-2014
• Mandelʹshtam, Nadezhda, 1899-1980
• Mandelʹshtam, Osip, 1891-1938
• Maramzin, Vladimir, 1934-
• Miłosz, Czesław, 1911-2004
• Nobel Prize winners
• Nobel lectures, including presentation speeches and laureates' biographies
• Photographs
• Picken, Margo
• Poetry -- 20th Century
• Poetry -- Translations into English
• Poetry -- Translations into Russian
• Poetry International (Festival)
• Poets, American -- 20th century
• Poets, Russian -- 20th Century
• Proffer, Carl R.
• Proffer, Ellendea, 1944-
• Russia -- Emigration and immigration
• Russian literature -- 20th Century
• Samizdat -- Russia
• Schiltz, Véronique, 1942-
• Shults, Sergei
• Solzhenit͡syn, Aleksandr Isaevich, 1918-2008
• Spender, Stephen, 1909-1995
• Sumerkin, Alexander, 1943-2006
• Translators
• Ufli︠a︡nd, Vladimir, 1937-
• Underground literature -- Soviet Union
• United States -- Emigration and immigration
• Verheul, Kees, 1940-
• Viereck, Peter, 1916-2006
• Vorobiov, Masha
• Walcott, Derek, 1930-2017
• Weissbort, Daniel, 1935-2013
• Wilbur, Richard, 1921-2017
• Ėtkind, E. G. (Efim Grigorʹevich), 1918-1999

Finding Aid & Administrative Information

Repository details.

Part of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library Repository

121 Wall Street New Haven, CT 06511

Opening Hours

Access information.

The Beinecke Library is open to all Yale University students and faculty, and visiting researchers whose work requires use of its special collections. You will need to bring appropriate photo ID the first time you register. Beinecke is a non-circulating, closed stack library. Paging is done by library staff during business hours. You can request collection material online at least two business days in advance of your visit, using the request links in Archives at Yale. For more information, please see Planning Your Research Visit and consult the Reading Room Policies prior to visiting the library.

Navigate the collection

Joseph Brodsky Papers. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

Cite Item Description

Joseph Brodsky Papers. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/11/resources/784 Accessed May 21, 2024.

Search form

Six faculty members honored for their commitment to teaching.

Left to right, Yale College Dean Pericles Lewis with prizewinners Carlos Eire, John Lafferty, Adriane Steinacker, David Blight, and Margherita Tortora. Not pictured: Sarah Demers. (Photo by John Dempsey)

Six members of the Yale faculty were named recipients of Yale College’s teaching prizes, which recognize exceptional undergraduate teaching.

The prizewinning teachers, all from Yale’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences, are David Blight, Sterling Professor of History and African American Studies; Sarah Demers, professor of physics; John Lafferty, the John C. Malone Professor of Statistics & Data Science; Adriane Steinacker, senior lecturer in Physics; Margherita Tortora, senior lector II in Spanish; and Carlos Eire, the T. Lawrason Riggs Professor of History and Religious Studies. 

They were recognized by Yale College Dean Pericles Lewis during a reception at the Humanities Quadrangle on April 29.

Among this year’s recipients are distinguished researchers and educators, some of who are the winners of previous teaching prizes: Demers was awarded the 2013-2014 Provost’s Teaching Prize, and Steinacker was awarded the Poorvu Family Fund for Academic Innovation Award in 2019.

Lewis praised all the recipients for their commitment to teaching undergraduates and to undergraduate education. He closed the formal presentation with a toast, quoting Chaucer’s words about the clerk of Oxenford: “gladly would he learn and gladly teach.”

The citations for the prizewinners follow:

David Blight, the Sidonie Miskimin Clauss Prize Awarded for teaching excellence in the humanities

“ David Blight, Sterling Professor of History and African American Studies, your students call your courses ‘legendary,’ they find your telling of history to be ‘illuminating’ and ‘gripping’ and they find your excitement for your subject matter ‘infectious.’ Your students have shared that with everything you bring to your teaching — primary sources, maps, personal diaries, public newspaper clippings and the thorough weaving of these sources in your lectures — they are surprised when you are eager to hear their [students’] perspectives and invite them to challenge your sources and ideas.

“ One student shared: ‘I would’ve sat in my seat in Civil War and Reconstruction for as long as he wanted to speak to us. His eloquence in articulating this time period in history not only demonstrated why it speaks to him, but why it should speak to us…He had me at: ‘we are the only species who can write our own past.’

“ Another said: ‘With his unmatched enthusiasm, Professor Blight is theatrical at the lectern, yelling, whispering, and even, yes, singing, when he sees fit. And with this, the war becomes funny, moving, and much, much sadder than any text could make it.’

“ You are known for your scholarship and your courses examining the Civil War and African-American History. Students have raved about your lectures and the way you are able to bring history to life, making it fun, particularly to those who are new to the discipline. In large lectures, you have dazzled large cohorts of undergraduates with your ‘storytelling abilities, critical insights, and dry sense of humor’ while simultaneously exhibiting ‘kindness, grace and dedication.’

“ Characteristics that make you particularly fitting for this prize are also those that are seen in smaller settings — the time that you carve out for individual students, mentoring their theses one-on-one, guiding them in a Directed Reading course, giving your time when your time is limited.

“ One student spoke to your ‘personal leadership and constant encouragement’ particularly well, sharing: ‘My interactions with him… constitute the single most formative experience I have had at Yale. When the Yale Admissions crew talks to prospective students about the incredible opportunities at Yale, this is what they mean. Blight goes above and beyond for his students in addition to teaching knock-out lectures. He could so easily retreat to his office, but he makes a point of interacting with undergrads and encouraging them to follow their academic pursuits.’

“ For your dedication to your students and their intellectual and personal growth, Yale College proudly awards the Sidonie Miskimin Clauss ’75 Prize for Teaching Excellence in the Humanities to you, Professor David Blight.”

Sarah Demers , the Dylan Hixon ’88 Prize Awarded for teaching excellence in the natural sciences

“ Sarah Demers, Professor of Physics, you are recognized as a leading researcher in your field, and you also have the unique ability and a solid reputation of dazzling students with your teaching. You have taught hundreds of students taking Physics for the Life Sciences as a pre-requisite for majors in the Biological Sciences and/or medical school — making the material enjoyable with your infectious enthusiasm.  Your innovative pedagogy and collaboration resulted in an interdisciplinary course examining ‘The Physics of Dance.’ Though the students in these courses are unlikely to become Physicists, with some saying, ‘I’m taking physics because I have to, not because I want to,’ you have helped many of them enjoy your courses, some of them to the point where they ‘fall in love with physics’ as a result of your teaching.

“ One student shared that ‘she fosters an environment that facilitates superlative learning…she exuded a positive energy that made learning topics in an arduous class, such as physics, an enjoyable experience — a rarity in modern education… she was able to bring lively anecdotes, stories, and interactions into her teachings… As the course progressed and the topics started to get more abstract, it was evident that she took the time to slow down and reiterate key points to make sure people were understanding them… Her emphasis on the importance of collaboration helped pushed me out of my comfort zone to work with other people on the problem sets. Working with others not only helped me get through the problems but also showed me that I wasn’t the only one struggling through these challenging problems. Knowing I wasn’t the only one struggling helped elevate how I felt about myself and aided in my personal growth.’

“ You have been able to build an inclusive environment in a large lecture course, seeking and incorporating feedback in real-time as your courses progress and fostering a collaborative environment among your students. One student said it well: ‘Her love for the subject is inspiring and contagious, and it manifests in the way she takes such good care of her class and students.’ Another shared: ‘She stayed late, went in early, took her class to the next level, and we are all the better for it. While taking a midterm, I vividly remembered her re-explaining a concept to me during class, and that made all the difference in the way I answered the question (and got it correct!).’

“ You bring that same enthusiasm and individual guidance to your role as Director of Undergraduate Studies, advising students in the major, facilitating student/mentor research relationships and ensuring that students ultimately cross the finish line.

“ For your inclusivity, patience and engaging classroom presence which instills passion in your students, Yale College is delighted to bestow the Dylan Hixon ‘88 Prize for Teaching Excellence in the Natural Sciences on you, Professor Sarah Demers.”

John Lafferty , the Lex Hixon ’63 Prize Awarded for teaching excellence in the social sciences

“ John Lafferty, John C. Malone Professor of Statistics & Data Science, your students find your lectures engaging, they find your teaching to be phenomenal, and they find your approachability and genuine interest in helping them with their own pursuits to be truly amazing.

“ Machine learning is a field that is constantly evolving, and your students notice and appreciate the tweaks you make to incorporate recent advancements. They feel prepared to enter the field with a solid foundation because of your ability to make difficult concepts, ‘like PCA or autoencoders’ digestible, while simultaneously bringing a statistical lens to their learning.

“ One student shared: ‘Despite being a research powerhouse, Professor Lafferty is so incredibly passionate about teaching and brought awesome energy to the classroom, which made me excited to be in class, even though it was at 9:00. The material he covered in class was inherently difficult, but he was acutely aware of that and did his best to work slowly and methodically through the tough concepts, never once relying on the typical STEM- “but this is so easy, you learned this in elementary school”-rhetoric…Instead, he was overwhelmingly supportive and helpful…’

“ Your students also speak highly of your pedagogical approaches when teaching machine learning, providing practical data sets, real-world examples and applications without losing the theoretical foundation — and somehow you also weave in a social/ethical lens. As one student put it, ‘Professor Lafferty manages to break down complex subjects into smaller parts, from neural networks to transformers behind ChatGPT,’ while another said, ‘He always kept the topics approachable and simplified complex concepts while still showing us the depths the concepts could reach.’

“ Students leave your courses inspired by the field and that often has to do with the passion you bring to your teaching. ‘A teacher has really excelled when they not only teach their students, but increase the students’ love and interest in their topic. Professor Lafferty certainly did so. I was already interested in machine learning, but now I leave the class knowing that machine learning is exactly the discipline to which I want to devote my life.’

“ What also sets you apart is your approachability and humility. As one student put it, ‘I’m amazed that someone can be so knowledgeable and accomplished, yet never intimidating or condescending. He really cares about teaching…In office hours, he was supportive, helpful, and easy to talk to. He seemed to genuinely care about each student and making sure that they were learning and succeeding.’

“ For your innovative, yet accessible teaching both in and out of the classroom, Yale College is proud to award the Lex Hixon ‘63 Prize for Teaching Excellence in the Social Sciences to you, Professor John Lafferty.”

Adriane Steinacker , the Richard Brodhead ’68 Prize Awarded for teaching excellence by instructional faculty

“ Adriane Steinacker, Senior Lecturer in Physics, your students are in awe of your ability to make a large lecture feel like home, a family. Over your years, sometimes teaching two large lectures of introductory Physics, students are astonished that you not only remember their names, but that you get to know them as students and as human beings. Your enthusiasm and love for Physics inspires your students, and motivates them to work hard, for themselves, but also as a way of thanking you for your efforts.

“ Your students repeatedly share their love for your in-class demonstrations, your wealth of online resources, sketches and notes, and your elaborate homework/practice problems — where you are constantly innovating, over the years, but also within a given term. This has ‘illuminated the beauty of the physical world’ for your students. One student shared, ‘This inspired me to appreciate physics in a way that I hadn’t before — I became able to view the world around me with a curious sense of wonder as I thought about all of the physics around me, from the Doppler effect illustrated by a passing ambulance to a car’s momentum.’ And another said, ‘She truly finds physics *beautiful,* and uses demonstrations and real life examples to relate the material to her students and help us see the logic and simplicity (and even beauty) in physics too.’

“ Of course, it is not just your classroom teaching that warrants praise. Over years of teaching, with the number of students you teach ever-expanding, your office hours are legendary. An overflow area needed because of your packed office, students feel encouraged in these spaces and appreciate the individualized attention they get, where ‘mistakes are welcomed as opportunities to learn.’ In your classroom and in your office, you have fostered a sense of belonging that comes up again and again, making students feel ‘capable of more than they think.’ As one student shared: ‘Professor Steinacker was never once condescending or judgmental, even when re-explaining basic rules of algebra or geometry that I had forgotten. Professor Steinacker did not for a single moment make me feel like I belonged any less in her class. She absolutely believed in me and my ability to learn. Another shared, ‘No form of help is beneath her.’

“ You have a way of immersing students in a difficult subject, helping them understand difficult concepts, without eroding the rigor of what they’re learning. One student called you ‘The bright point in this dark, swirling sea of derivatives and vectors’ and another shared, ‘Above all, she is always smiling and reminding us of the life’s joys, from quotidian to profound — the midday sun, the satisfaction of setting up a physics experiment and seeing it unravel, the sight of Jupiter’s moons.’

“ Yale College is thus honored to award the Richard H. Brodhead ’68 Prize for Teaching Excellence to you, Adriane Steinacker.”

Margherita Tortora , the Richard H. Brodhead ’68 Prize Awarded for teaching excellence by instructional faculty

“ Margherita Tortora, Senior Lector II in Spanish, throughout your thirty-plus years teaching at Yale, your students find that your classroom is ‘not solely a classroom, but a place of worldmaking and rich intellectual imagination.’

“ You bring yourself fully to your courses, immersing your students in Spanish language in ways that are innovative and inspiring. As one student shared: ‘Professor Tortora attunes herself consistently to the communities around her and weaves them together into incredibly generative pedagogical frameworks, often exemplifying the principles of place-based education.’

“ Your students often take multiple courses with you both on campus during the academic year and during your study abroad program in Ecuador — these learning opportunities shape their Yale education and their sense of belonging in Yale College as a whole. You forge relationships with your students, but also foster new relationships for them, facilitating mentoring relationships that are personalized to a given student’s interest. They are dazzled by your network and the way you bring them into the fold.  As one student said, ‘I witnessed first-hand how genuinely involved she is with local communities and the fact that incorporating experiential learning in her classes is a labor of love for her’ and another shared, ‘With every connection, lesson, guest speaker, and incredible experience it became more clear that we were all experiencing a once in a life time journey of learning that completely rested on the community the professor had built over the years of traveling, teaching, and running her program.’

“ Your teaching methods are also innovative and transformative outside of the classroom. Your assessments, including long oral presentations, push and challenge your students in their language learning and your constructive and timely feedback on written assessments is impactful, resulting in ‘a rare blend of scholarly rigor and compassionate mentorship.’ The annual Latino & Iberian Film Festival at Yale (LIFFY) that you helped found benefits your students, in addition to our local Yale and New Haven communities. As one student shared, ‘Certainly for students in her class these are not just film screenings, they are unique opportunities to use their language and critical thinking skills, to ask pressing questions, to be challenged, and to get involved with certain aspects of the festival. These are the kind of exceptionally enriching experiential learning opportunities…The impact of these learning moments is quite deep and often immeasurable, and in many ways, these are exactly the type of learning experiences that continue to make a Yale education truly extraordinary’ and another said, ‘…she encourages us, she uplifts us. And now it is time to return the favor and show her how grateful we are for her admirable teaching.’

“ Yale College is thus honored to award the Richard H. Brodhead ‘68 Prize for Teaching Excellence to you, Margherita Tortora.”

Carlos Eire , the Harwood F. Byrnes/Richard B. Sewall Teaching Prize Awarded to any faculty member who over a long period of service has inspired a great number of students and consistently fostered the learning process both inside and outside the classroom

“ Since joining Yale’s faculty in 1996 (after receiving your Ph.D. from Yale in 1979), Carlos Eire, T. Lawrason Riggs Professor of History and Religious Studies, you have steadily been recognized by your students for your dynamic and passionate teaching style over your many years.  Students are captivated to your lectures, they admire your ability to provide both structure and flexibility in your seminars, and they appreciate the individualized and compassionate attention you give them in your office hours.

“ Your students share their feelings about your teaching and courses eloquently. One student shared: ‘Professor Eire blends scholarship, humor, factual information, and lively anecdotes into lectures that are interesting and educational… (he) has a gift for invigorating esoteric church history and Reformation theology,’ and another said, ‘this class proved to me that it is possible to have a class of many divergent opinions that functions progressively… The workload was considerably hefty for this course, but all the readings were so relevant and interesting that it was impossible to complain about it… His manner was that of a mentor– he was always ready to share his personal stories, but only so far as they would benefit us as students… His own opinions about religion remain a mystery to me; he acted purely as purveyor and interpreter of historical evidence.’

“ Students have called you their ‘best professor’ at Yale and have ‘never looked forward to class more than’ yours — they love learning from you. One student shared, ‘An example of his dynamic teaching style is when he was trying to explain how the Swiss reformation were burning and destroying idols. “They shouted defend yourselves,” he explained, “And when the idols didn’t do anything, they took it as a sign that they were not divine and burnt them.” To demonstrate the ridiculousness of this practice, he grabbed a dollar bill and shouted, “DEFEND YOURSELF,”’ Another shared, ‘It takes a special sort of teacher to interest an entire class in a 4th century ascetic monk.’ Your students praise your genuineness and humility that you bring to your classroom, without losing the rigor and depth of the material they are learning.

“ For your dedication to your students throughout your many years in our History department, Yale College is proud to award the 2018 Harwood F. Byrnes / Richard B. Sewall Teaching Prize to you, Professor Carlos Eire.”

• Four honored for commitment to graduate student mentorship
• Junior faculty members receive this year’s Poorvu Innovation Award

Campus & Community

Playing together: At the Yale School of Music, García-León builds community

LSF at 25: Safeguarding Yale’s world-class library collections

Meet the FAS faculty: Bhart-Anjan Bhullar

Study identifies driver of liver cancer that could be target for treatment

• Show More Articles